if it floats to the top, it means air has penetrated the shell and it will be rancid. if it sits at the bottom, but with the tip pointing up, it will be fine but about to turn. if it lies on its side on the bottom, it will be perfect.

would be to try and give it a good life. take it to the cinema, have birthday parties for it. all the while hoping that it never learns to communicate, lest it should ask you why god has allowed it to exist.

hunched down behind an overtunred shelf, a gun in one hand, the egg in the other. "i can't take any more,' it moans in its strange tongue. and you: "and this knowledge, it burns in my head; why did you pick me? no-one should know the things you have taught, little egg-eye-wavy-hand man."

the police creep up behind the barricade only to find you with your gun in your mouth and brains spattered across the condiments; your other fist clenched tightly in death. they prise it open to find a quivering mass of blood, viscous jelly and shell